The Best of 2014: The Year in Music – Part 2 of 3

As mentioned in my introductory installment of this year-end review, there were plenty of records that I liked well enough, but not many that I actually loved. I’ve read and absorbed as many lists over the past month as I could, but my list remained pretty consistent throughout.

So, here are my favorites. They’re organized in order of preference as well as I could manage at the time of writing this. The first ten are pretty solid, but it kind of goes to hell after that. The honorable mentions are records that might rank differently on any given day depending on my mood. I know there are records that I’ll discover months from now that would make this list if I were aware of them. There are records that I bought and liked at the time that didn’t make the cut because I brought them home and barely played them. I haven’t bought some of things on here. What follows are the records I kept going back to, records that made me excited to hear them again.

The Top Ten

1. D’angelo – Black Messiah: This is why you don’t make best-of lists until the end of a year. It’s a little silly for me to rate this record this high when it’s only been out for a few weeks. At the same time, part of me feels that in a few more weeks I might regret not putting it at number one. This may be a Sgt. Pepper’s/Dark Side caliber record – time will only tell. The fact that we’ve been waiting for it for 14 years puts all kinds of pressure on it to live up to the wait. It can’t possibly be as good as Questlove has been saying for the past two years, could it? Um, maybe. I think it might be better than Voodoo which is pretty ridiculous to think about. It’s tighter than Voodoo, more broad and artful than Brown Sugar. Sure, Prince put out two not-bad records this year, but nothing on them is as good of a Prince song as “The Charade.” The production is deep, dark, and murky which is why it’s drawn so many There’s a Riot Goin’ On comparisons. There are small sounds in the mix buried like treasure. The vocals are often obscured. This makes me listen all the more intently, drawing me in. It’s a deep album in the sense that I expect I’ll still new things in it a year from now. People generally don’t dream records this big anymore. Marvin, Sly, Curtis, Stevie, Bowie, Prince, and Kate Bush all used to make records with this scope. Kanye and Janelle Monae have made albums with this reach, but neither has achieved this level of sophisticated grace – and I say that as someone who likes Kanye and Janelle. There’s soul, gospel, jazz, rock, hell, even flamenco, here and it all works. It’s the kind of record that I want to talk to everybody about and ask them what they think. I wonder what Kanye and Prince think of it. Are they jealous? Does it make Greg Dulli hate himself? Questlove said of the record at the listening party, “It’s everything.” That’s not much of a stretch. It has a Whitman-esque world-encompassing, multitude-containing aspect. It’s an album that feels both like old fashioned soul music and at the same time as cutting edge as any record by The Knife. The story behind the album’s surprise rush release at the end of the year is that it was a reaction to the events of this past fall. I wonder if coming out after all the critics lists are in for the year and too early for 2015 will doom it to be lost and ignored. It doesn’t matter. I think it’s too strong not to last.

2. Alvvays – Alvvays: This is just good indie rock. Great melodies and songs that don’t sound forced. It’s not game-changing or epic, and it’s not particularly original (you could easily convince someone it’s a new Bettie Serveert record). So why rank it so high? Listening to it made me happier than any other record this year. How’s that for an objective criteria? The production combines mid-90s low-fi charm with 60s reverb which likely plays on an inadvertent nostalgia inside of me. There’s an innocence to this album that I haven’t heard in a while and I can’t help but find it endearing. Alvvays is incredibly romantic and wide-eyed, leading with its heart, songs of someone terribly afraid to miss out on the love of one’s life. There’s windswept desperation, longing, and wit in the lyrics and voice of Molly Rankin that makes your heart ache and soar at the same time. This is the record that I once hoped Park Ave. would make, an ode of longing for love before knowing what loss really is.

3. La Roux – Trouble in Paradise: This is effortless pop/dance music that’s fun and sexy – a mix of new wave and italo disco. There’s also something that reminds me of early Prince in that cocky, self-assured, flirty swagger. Like Prince, Elly Jackson performs and produces most of the music herself. Now that she has split with bandmate Ben Langmaid, there will no longer be any doubt that La Roux will be seen as wholly her vehicle. If Alvvays is my idea of a long lost Park Ave. masterpiece, then this would be the Tilly and the Wall record they might make if they ever ditched the guys. As bright and bouncy as a record about relationships on the rocks could be, this is the most emotionally tough record released this year.

4. Jessie Ware – Tough Love: This is more expansive than her debut. Some might say Ware is too calculated: a new, market-tested Sade for rich condo dwellers. Maybe she is. The music is great regardless. It’s hearing sophisticated pop like this that throws dross like Charli XCX and Meghan Trainor into sharp relief. This is adult music for grown-ups. Tough Love has epic, expansively lush production and emotional vocal performances. I loved her last record and this one only improves on what that one did well. I don’t understand how this wasn’t a hit record. How do people pick Lana Del Ray over this?

5. Wye Oak – Shriek: I’ve heard people who’ve liked their older albums (and sound) don’t care much for this new album. I have to say I feel the same way, only in reverse. I never cared for their previous work. It felt too self-absorbed and depressed to me. This is light and airy by comparison. The way the off-kilter arpeggiated keyboard riff in album-opener “Before” suddenly locks into an easy groove once the drums and bass come in sounds like a new morning in the bands career. It’s the best song on here along with the closer, “Logic of Color.” They’ve gone new wave and it’s a good sound on them.

6. Swans – To Be Kind: From a purely aesthetic standpoint, aside from the D’Angelo album, this is probably the most masterful record on this list in terms of completeness of vision and perfection of execution. Like all their work, however, it’s not something you throw on lightly. Aside from the abrasive sounds, the length of the songs are going to be a hurdle for most people – two discs with only one song under seven minutes and five songs over ten. This music takes its time with an almost ritualistic, tantric sensuality. Gira is still brutal these days, but now he sounds like he’s having fun sculling the rivers at the bottom of the sewers.

7. Clark – Clark: I realize that placing this Warp Records release higher than that other record on the same label (more anon) will seem ridiculous to some. This one was personally more satisfying. Chris Clark offers up a darker, maybe more goth-friendly, vision. “Winter Linn” could even possibly be slipped into a DJ set of the latest Metropolis singles and no one might notice. That’s not meant to be an indictment, just an indication that this is a record that has a personality of its own outside of most techno platters. The key track for me is the penultimate “There’s A Distance in You” which starts small and builds into a squealing banger before airing out into a saxophone drenched cloud of gray heaven. I can’t prove that Colin Stetson played on this, but it sure sounds like him. Clark may have even played the horn himself if the liners are to be trusted. That other record on Warp might have drawn bigger headlines, but this was my favorite electronic music of the year.

8. Sturgill Simpson – Metamodern Sounds in Country Music: This album plays like an imaginary, long-lost psychedelic record by Waylon Jennings. His cover of When In Rome’s “The Promise” is reborn as an American western ballad, tapping into a grit that the original never had (and I love the original). There’s an embryonic warmth in Simpson’s voice that screams classic country, but his lyrics follow in a long line of folksy, yet cosmic American transcendentalism from Emerson and Thoreau down to Woody Guthrie and Willie Nelson. Rock fans have already accepted Simpson, but make no mistake, this record is legitimate country music, not alternative country which is too often indie rockers playing cowboy. It does push the envelope by adding psychedelic touches to the sound, but musically it’s closer to George Strait and Alan Jackson than Justin Townes Earle. Simpson isn’t interested in saving country music, but if he continues making records this good I hope that Nashville and (more importantly) country music audiences begin to embrace something other than jock-jam bro-country.

9. White Lung – Deep Fantasy: I never liked Hole. White Lung sounds like if Hole had been a good band. Deep Fantasy is an album full of short, fast songs that doesn’t overstay its welcome. It was by far the toughest, ballsiest record I heard this year. I’d love to see them play on the Grammys. It would be a shot of guts that would shred the rest of the milquetoast fair that program offers up.  I always hear people complaining that music doesn’t rock like it used to. This record refutes that gripe. It’s true that twenty years ago there were thousands of bands that played music like this, but only one in several hundred made records this good. I’d argue that if Deep Fantasy was released in 1994 it would still stand out from the crowd. Singer Mish Way’s Marlboro-filtered voice and Kenneth William’s Big Black-like ringing harmonic guitar storm through each song, one raging right after the other. It’s not just a blur of noise either; there are great big hooks here. They’re just flying at your head at high speed.

10. Liars – Mess: These guys crack me up. From the first lines of this record they immediately suck the pompousness out of the room. Not since the Butthole Surfers has a band been able to make you laugh while at the same time daring you not to take them seriously. “Mask Maker” begins the record with the words: “Take my pants off/Use my socks/Smell my socks/Eat my face off/Eat my face off/Take my face/Get me your face/Give me your face…” It’s completely Buffalo Bill, Swans-style horrorshow, but it makes you want to boogie. The funniest (or scariest) thing about the Liars is how methodically consistent they are for how psychopathic their music sounds. Mess continues the move towards electronic dance music that they started on WIXIW, however this isn’t electronic music in the sense of faux dubsteppers like Skrillex or pop-dance dudes like Calvin Harris. I fantasize that the Liars are Freddy Krueger-like dream demons who terrorize Skrillex and Harris at night for their sins in the waking world. That would be righteous justice.

Honorable Mentions (The Best of the Rest)

I didn’t number the rest of what follows. I’m less sure of how I feel about these records than I am of the ones above. They’re listed in a loose order, ranked roughly in preference. They’re followed by one latecomer from last year and my favorite complilation/reissue.

Mac DeMarco – Salad Days: Do you remember when Blur fell in love with Pavement in 1997? This sounds like if Damon Albarn tried to make a Stephen Malkmus solo album. It’s a nice groovy, laidback set of warm slack. The album was recorded in DeMarco’s apartment, but it sounds open and clear instead of low-fi and claustrophobic. It has a friendly, laissez-faire Kevin Ayers feel without aping the banana god’s actual music. With more listens this might have made it into my top 10. The fact that he’s only 24 fills me with envy, but he has a voice that will age well as he sounds like he could just as easily be 54.

Wild Beasts – Present Tense: The fact that this record is as high on this list as it is stands as a testament to how much I like this band because it’s not that great of a record. There are four really good songs on it: “Wanderlust,” “Sweet Spot,” “A Simple Beautiful Truth,” and “Palace.” The Hayden Thorpe-led songs are the winners here. The Tom Fleming tracks are dogs by comparison to be honest, “Nature Boy” and “Daughters” among them. There really isn’t anything really bad on the record; it’s all just too tepid coming from a band as invigorating as this. All the vim and vigor of Limbo, Panto seems to have been drained out of them. I don’t mind the move towards synths and electronics, but I just wish for more of their early, spastic harlequin energy. Drummer Chris Talbot continues to be a consistently inventive player despite not having the bangers to get behind that he once did. Based on this record I wouldn’t be surprised if they broke up which would be preferable to me than seeing them become Radiohead.

Future Islands – Singles: I really liked this record when it first came out, but I either burned out on it or it just hasn’t held up for me like I thought it would. My biggest complaint? There’s too much positivity in it, too much communal good feeling. Songs like “Sun in the Morning” and “A Song for our Grandfathers” make me feel like I’m listening to a Ziggy Marley record. That said, the new wave basslines and lead singer Samuel Herring’s indomitable spirit make for an incredibly winning combo. Their performance of “Seasons (Waiting On You)” on Letterman might have been the best pop music moment of the year.

Pere Ubu – Carnival of Souls: This is the second record of theirs named after a classic B-movie and it’s even better than Lady of Shanghai. This is a band that hasn’t toned down the weirdness after all this time. Almost 40 years into their career, they are putting out music that compares well with some of their early best. No, it’s not at the level of the Hearthan singles or The Modern Dance or Dub Housing, but that’s an almost impossible standard to hit (although I would argue that 2009’s Long Live Pere Ubu did). It is easily as good as, if not better than, The Art of Walking or Song of the Bailing Man.

Planningtorock – All Love’s Legal: Much was made of the new Against Me! record being a revolutionary screed of gender freedom, but this record tackles the same terrain without the overwrought solipsism. Planningtorock is just as polemical as Against Me!, but the music actually sounds new and revolutionary rather than just a rockist retread. Besides that, the message is rendered with real pride, joy, and celebration rather than reactionary angst. The day-glo alien dance sound offers an enticing inclusivity that doesn’t rail against its oppressors so much as push them aside while stepping into its own future. Like The Juan MacLean (next), Planningtorock are moving on after the group they’re most often associated with has broken up, in Planningtorock’s case, The Knife. Jam Rostron, who is Planningtorock, continues to obscure her image like The Knife, but Rostron uses it as another way of making a statement of gender politics in the arts. She also uses the final line from The Knife’s “Full of Fire” as a launch pad for an invitation to discourse through dance and music. Planningtorock is about reinventing yourself out of your origins.

The Juan MacLean – In A Dream: This is the first time this group has sounded like an actual group to me rather than just another non-LCD DFA project. The question is now that LCD is no more will they, or can they, fill the gap that band left? The answer is no, and that’s to be expected. What made LCD different than all other similar groups (The Rapture, !!!, Hot Chip, Joachim, etc.) is James Murphy. Murphy infused his project with his aging rock-nerd personality. All too often, these dance rock guys have aimed for Kraftwerk-like anonymity rather than Murphy’s Lou Reed-like full disclosure. Cold is cool, but Murphy’s warmth and humanity is cooler than cool. It’s the same goofy, flawed humanity Bernard Sumner brought to New Order. The Juan Maclean is still pretty icy, even when playing disco and house. You can begin to hear a bit of a thaw though on “Love Stops Here.” Past collaborator and former LCD member, Nancy Whang, seems more like a full-fledged member now; and whether this new warmth is a result of her direct influence or rather just a catalytic result of her presence, it’s a move in the right direction.

Jungle – Jungle: The video for lead-off track, “The Heat,” is a perfect visual for this music, two old-school rollerskate dancers breaking under a bridge. This album has an instantaneous cool about it. It’s also ridiculously catchy, almost enough to make me wary of it. It’s the kind of “Dry the Rain” record you could throw on in a record shop on a busy day and have half-a-dozen people asking what it is by the middle of the third track. The whole thing is suffused with smoky, laidback grooves and falsetto vocals which make for great background music at home or driving around town.

Ibibio Sound Machine – Ibibio Sound Machine: Despite hailing from London, this is modern African music, like Amadou & Mariam, which doesn’t sound retro or beholden to Western conceptions of “world music.” This record is more dance music than Amadou & Mariam, but it’s just as funky and soulful in a Talking Heads/Bush Tetras meets Fela way. Horns mix with new wave synths over a bedrock of Afro-Funk. Singer Eno Williams Uffort’s voice reminds me of Shara Nelson from Massive Attack at certain moments, and although I don’t understand the lyrics the spirit is put across.

Robyn Hitchcock – The Man Upstairs: The Man Upstairs is a Joe Boyd-produced set consisting of half covers and half originals from one of the most singular British songwriters of the past 35 years. So why should you listen to such a talented songsmith do other people’s songs? Because Hitchcock is a great interpreter and hearing him cover the Psychedelic Furs “Ghost in You” or Roxy’s “To Turn You On” is to hear them through his Strawberry Fields-focused filter. The originals here feel of a piece with the rest. New songs “San Francisco Patrol” and “Recalling the Truth” are the kind of casually brilliant songs that would garner loud praise if penned by Dylan, Cohen, or Neil Young. However, even Hitchcock can’t make “Crystal Ship” not suck. You can’t expect them all to be gold.

Blonde Redhead – Barragán: Let me be clear: this isn’t as good of a record as some that they’ve made in the past, but it does hold its own charms. Blonde Redhead is nothing if not charming. “Dripping” offers up a loose, languorous funk topped with a vocal melody of sleepy-eyed seduction. The almost-nine minute “Mind to Be Had” has a trance-inducing effect. Elsewhere, the arrangements are more minimal than they have been in the past which makes more room for some delicate left turns. I’m still intrigued by them and I still want to hear where their baroque vision takes them next.

Ryan Adams – 1984: Ryan Adam put out two records this year. One of them is a great rock & roll record; and the other is something for Ryan Adams fans to listen to. This is the good one. Naturally, Adams put it out as a limited, vinyl-only release as part of his PAX AM Singles Series that’s already unavailable. Essentially, it’s a throwaway. It’s telling that my favorite Ryan Adams record is Demolition which was a collection of leftover tracks cobbled together with nothing more than a second thought. Most of Adams’s records are too overwrought and contrived. His other record this year, the self-titled record, is showing up on a lot of other best-of lists, but I think Adams himself knows better. Ryan Adams, with its Bryan Adams Reckless typeface, seems to be trolling his own fanbase who crave and encourage his worst tendencies. 1984 is a short, sharp injection of Husker Du-fueled rock. The whole thing is 11 songs in less than 15 minutes which is about all the Ryan Adams anyone needs.

Ty Segall – Manipulator: I haven’t heard this record enough yet. It’s a mix of glam and psychedelic rock: a little T. Rex, a little Jay Reatard, some Stooges, and maybe even some Bobby Conn. He rocks harder than a lot of his retro-contemporaries; he’s the Rolling Stones to Temples’ Beatles (see below). At 56-minutes this record’s a little hard to digest without repeat listens. It will either continue to grow on me or I’ll have forgotten it completely in another year.

Israel Nash – Israel Nash’s Rain Plans: This has some CCR and Neil Young shine to it. It’s a good hippie record. I thought it was a better Neil Young record than the record Neil put out this year. Along with Neil, this record seems like it owes something to Jimmy Webb & America’s soundtrack to “The Last Unicorn” (it’s not that good though). He’ll probably get himself a big-name producer and make a really terrible record next. I hope not.

Todd Terje – It’s Album Time: This record has a space-age bachelor pad, international lounge music from a 70s European film soundtrack vibe – the kind of record Shawn Lee used to do well. It also rescues the brilliant Bryan Ferry cover of Robert Palmer’s “Johnny and Mary” from Ferry’s pretty meh new record. That guest spot is an ingenious idea. The song centers the record for me around a projected narrative idea of the lonely melancholy of a jet-setting cosmopolitan man of leisure. It would be silly to call this a concept album as some of these tracks have been around for over a year. Still, the whole piece has a continental unity of sound, if not theme, as evidenced by “Oh Joy,” a Benny & Bjorn-like rendering of some italo/Alan Parsons Project Frankenstein. It’s pretty cheesy and uncool, but wonderfully so.

Temples – Sun Structures: Temples are this year’s Tame Impala or Foxygen. The songs from this record could have been pulled off of the Nuggets II box set. They aim for the same “Rain”-era Beatles psychedelia that countless other bands in the last thirty years have attempted. Although lots of bands have adopted this same 60s echo chamber sound, most don’t come up with vocal melodies like those in “The Golden Throne.” That said, I couldn’t quote you any lyric or tell you what any of the songs are about.

Aphex Twin – Syro: A fun return that doesn’t break new ground but does what he does better than anyone else: quirky, hyperactive techno with grace and humor. Richard D. James has apparently been making music this entire time, just not releasing it. Techno’s J.D. Salinger has said he’s been working on finally collecting this work into releasable form in the near future. If that comes to pass, we could be listening to “new” Aphex records on a regular basis. Worse things could happen.

Theophilus London – Vibes: Theophilus actually got Leon Ware on the record this time instead of just cribbing his front cover style. More than Ware, he reminds me of Eddy Grant in that he doesn’t seem to fit into any niche but his own. “Neu Law” is the best track on here and it has a Grant-like electro funk. One of these days he’s going to have a huge “Electric Avenue”-sized hit. For now, I’ll enjoy his stand-ins for “Killer on the Rampage” and “Romancing the Stone.” London is still trying to figure his own riddle out which is maybe why I’m still interested.

FKA Twigs – LP1: The easy comparisons are Bjork and Martina Topley-Bird. This has a really moody trip-hop drag to it. It manages to be both icy and vulnerable at the same time which is a neat trick. While the space in the arrangements is the key, next time out I’d like a little more meat on the bones musically speaking, but we’ll see what we get.

Hercules & Love Affair – The Feast of the Broken Heart: I really got into this record when it first came out, but I’ve since cooled on it a bit. What’s curious is that it made me go back to their second album, Blue Songs, which I kind of wrote off when it came out. Now, Blue Songs sounds great to me. Neither the second nor this third have met the standard of that first eponymous album, but Andrew Butler’s project still retains the feeling of a revolving cast of characters. This album’s most significant new family member is John Grant who fits in perfectly with the crew.

Parquet Courts – Sunbathing Animal/Content Nausea: Neither of these was as good as the band’s previous records, but they were still good. The current kings of college rock slack continue to pump out post-Velvets jams in the same mold as their sonic forebears Television, The Fall, Pavement, The Strokes, etc. They probably could have condensed these two records into one better one, but I’m hoping the next one is even better.

Ex Hex – Rips: I was never a Helium fan, but I like that Wild Flag got Mary Timony to rock out more. This is good, Sweet/Suzi Quatro power pop. It’s a bit one-note, both musically and emotionally, but it’s a good record for driving around town in the summer. There are even traces of an early-KISS influence, like on “Radio On,” which has a bridge riff reminiscent of “Calling Dr. Love.” Rips is the kind of record Rodney Bingenheimer would have spun at his English Disco club.

Marissa Nadler – July: I loved her first three records but lost interest in her after that. This one grew on me slowly. It’s still growing on me. Nadler is still a terrific guitar player and her ghostly vocals are as beautiful as ever. Nadler has always struck me as sharing something similar to Leonard Cohen, but she lacks Cohen’s self-believe, his wit, and his steel. Nadler could use a little more flint in her voice. Cohen has always been an old man (even when he was a young one). Perhaps with age, Nadler will look to Marianne Faithfull as a role-model and start to take no prisoners. She may never make her Broken English, but hopefully she’ll give us a Songs for the Gentle Man (see Bridget St. John).

The Coral – Curse of Love: It’s surprising that this band is still making records considering how largely ignored they’ve always been. They could be releasing and distributing this music in a closet for all the notice it will get. This isn’t their best, but it’s nice, dark folk rock, like a collection of sad, psychedelic sea shanties.

Compilation/Reissue:

Sun Ra – In the Orbit of Ra: I owned another Sun Ra compilation before this came out, but Sun Ra’s catalog is so overwhelming you get the feeling that you’re only scratching the surface of music he made. This new collection was curated and assembled by saxophonist and band-member Marshall Allen who has put together what feels like a broad, but unified 2-disc set. Sun Ra was part Thelonious Monk, part Moondog. This is a really wonderful way to explore the interplanetary jazz excursions on a true American genius.

Late Entry from Last Year:

Josephine Foster – I’m A Dreamer: This is a recent discovery which came out at the end of 2013. If it wasn’t a question of eligibility this would be much higher up the list. Foster is an American signed to the British import Fire Records which is to say she is doomed to not being heard. Fire has always been terrible at promoting, marketing, and distributing their records stateside leaving good records stranded without an audience. The crime in this instance is that Foster would have a shot at an actual sizeable indie audience. If the Current played this record, she would sell a couple box-lots locally and sell out the Cedar. She’s has an old-timey feel to her that feels honest and not hackneyed. Her voice has wisdom behind it. It feels a little worn and weathered. Although she’s much quirkier stylistically, this is what I wish Marissa Nadler had more of – a seasoned, less-fragile worldview.

The Playlist

 Here's a playlist of tracks from the above albums followed by some videos, including a Ty Segall video because Manipulator isn't on Spotify.

Not the Best of 2014: The Year in Music - Part 1 of 3

The overall impression I’m left with of this past year’s music is one of being underwhelmed. There was a lot of music I liked, but very little I loved. Even artists whose works I’ve loved in the past turned in efforts that were serviceable - good but not great.

Sometimes it’s useful to judge a best-of list by its omissions along with what’s included. With that in mind, here are some records that didn’t make my list this year. These are not honorable mentions: records that I liked but narrowly missed the list. Neither are they records I hated. They’re records that showed up on other best-of lists or left a large commercial footprint this year, but made little or no impression on me. These are records that made me feel out of step because I just didn’t get it. Do you remember Spin magazine’s original stoplight rating system (green, yellow, red)? These records are solid yellows for me.

This list isn’t meant as a critical attack on these artists; it’s more of a response to other best-of lists. I’m sure plenty will disagree with some of this list, if not call into question the need for such a list at all. Isn’t there enough negativity in the world without having to call out records for not being as good or excellent as some people think? Absolutely. But this is the internet, and you’ve entered my dark corner of it, so enjoy.

Taylor Swift - 1989: Taylor Swift won 2014. Lots of people (my wife included) like this new record. It aims to please and has a professional polish that is hard to dismiss. It’s even become hip to listen to TS. So, what’s my problem? Taylor Swift makes music that is not just cute, but cutesy. I have a hard time with cutesy. Gwen Stefani and No Doubt are cutesy. So are Death Cab for Cutie and The Decemberists, for that matter (see also: Katy Perry, Justin Bieber, Bruno Mars, etc.). 1989 was a pivotal year for pop music (one of the very best), and for me personally - I started high school. Taylor Swift was born that year. This record makes me feel old even without that factoid. I know it wasn't created with me in mind. I don't judge anyone for liking this record; I just reserve the right to ignore it without being considered a snob even though everyone will think I am anyway. Oh well, haters gonna hate, right?

Ariana Grande - My Everything/Iggy Azalea - The New Classic/Charlie XCX - Sucker/Azealia Banks - Broke with Expensive Tastes/Lana Del Ray - Ultraviolence/Nicki Minaj - The Pinkprint: It’s completely unfair of me to lump all of these artists together considering how different they are from each other stylistically, but I feel they’re all being marketed to the same audiences under the same rationale. That pluralization of “audience” was on purpose. This is music designed to cross over. Taylor Swift could have easily been lumped in here as well, but her success makes her worthy of her own note. All of it is blown up to obscene proportions and none of it is compelling to me in the least. I don’t really hate any of it, but I don’t understand why these records are showing up on other lists. I’ve also lumped them together because as women they are being marketed in a way that I find grotesque. Men aren’t marketed this way. A great deal of noise has been made about how each of them write their own material in a way that’s completely condescending while at the same time treating them in a sexually exploitative way. This isn’t new behavior, but whereas it used to de rigueur when talking about female musicians, it’s not always the case now. Looking over the names of the female artists whose records did make my best of list (see part 2), it’s the music that people talk about, not the artists themselves as mannequins. Maybe I’m being a unfair to Banks and Minaj who have genuine talent. I won’t go into the whole Azalea vs. Azealia feud. White person exploiting black art and culture?  That’s another old story.

Ed Sheeran - X/Hozier - Hozier/Sam Smith - In the Lonely Hour/Ray Lamontagne - Supernova/Beck - Morning Phase: This category is the other end of the gendered spectrum to the previous one. Stylistic differences aside, these male artists are marketed in the same way as each other: sensitive, earnest men who are serious artists. It sounds like a lot of self-important, navel-gazing baloney to me. I’ve even liked some of Ray Lamontagne’s music in the past, but he’s always tread a fine line for me. These kind of records make me want to put on Ted Nugent’s Free-for-All. Jeff Tweedy’s album that he did with his son as a tribute to seriously ill wife is an example of how to make a heartfelt record without falling into sentimental dreck. That record, Sukierae, didn’t make my best of list either (a little too long and scattershot for me), but it expresses honest emotion in a more - pardon me - manly way.

War On Drugs - Lost in the Dream/Sun Kil Moon - Benji: These are two records from two talented outfits which I just couldn’t get into. Both of them are also ending up near the top of a lot of best-of lists this year. It just so happens that the groups themselves were involved in a silly feud with each other. I’d like to think that the public spat didn’t affect my opinion on their actual recordings, but I can’t say that for sure. War On Drugs’ record sounds like recent Destroyer doing a humorless imitation of Dire Straits covering Springsteen’s Tunnel of Love. Although I’ve never been a huge Mark Kozelek fan, after seeing his live solo show a few years ago I was really impressed with him as a guitar player and performer. His new record, however, sounds like a bitter, old crank recounting every depressing tragedy he’s ever witnessed - like a bizarro world Dan Fogelberg. It’s harrowing and humorless in its own way. I can appreciate it, but from a distance. Kozelek’s two one-off songs mocking WOD were more interesting (and hilarious) than either full-length. It’s a shame he didn’t press them up as a special Record Store Day Black Friday 7”. That would have been a keeper. Kozelek may be a jerk and everyone may have sided with WOD, but there’s no question he won the feud.

Spooky/Post-Punk: There were a bunch of records in this category that came out this year. I’m not putting any of them on my list because I didn’t feel compelled to listen to them more than a few times. This doesn’t mean that they aren't worth listening to, but it’s just not where I’m at right now. If you’re interested, here are some of the records that came out this year in this vein.

• Have A Nice Life - The Unnatural World: There’s potential here if the singer ever stops being embarrassed of his own voice and afraid to let the hooks shine through.
• Cult of Youth - Final Days: Has Douglas P. heard these guys? If not, he should take a listen and call his lawyer. A track like “Of Amber” would make a great parody if DIJ weren’t already the perfect parody of themselves.
• Total Control - Typical System: Stylistically this is a mess. It sounds like people who got into post-punk from a Spotify playlist where there’s no differentiation between Young Marble Giants and Ultravox, which makes it kind of funny. Welcome to the context-free future.
• Protomartyr - Under Color of the Official Right: Everyone kept telling me to listen to this. It’s okay, I guess. Meh.
• Iceage - Plowing Into the Field of Love: For fashion.
• Merchandise - After the End: Rufus Wainwright fronting the Hoodoo Gurus. No, really. For real.
• Interpol - El Pintor: Worst/funniest lyrics in rock. Now with falsetto.

Metal: Heavy metal just isn’t made for me anymore. It’s splintered into a million sub-genres, and none of them do anything for me. There are people who get close: Mastodon, Electric Wizard, High on Fire, Witchcraft, etc., but nearly all are missing those things I want most out of metal. Jesus people. Am I going to have to make the metal album that I’ve been contemplating for years, just to make the music no one else will? Even the mighty Black Sabbath put out a new Ozzy-fronted record this year, which sounded as perfunctory as expected. Maybe if Bill had been a part of it would have been better. Maybe if they had a different producer (does Rubin even “produce”) it could have been something (I would have loved to hear what Albini or John Cale would have done with them). On the other hand, probably not. Mastodon, Electric Wizard, Pilgrim and Pallbearer all put out some fine records this year; I just can’t fool myself into thinking that they satisfy me.

Foo Fighters - Sonic Highways: The HBO documentary series was great. The album that resulted from it didn’t move me though. Dave Grohl is apparently a really great guy. Pat Smear is cool and graceful. I’m glad post-SDRE bassist, Nate Mendel, will be able to retire. Guitarist Chris Shiflett is a perfectly competent studio dude. And drummer Taylor Hawkins makes the best golden retriever Grohl - or any dog lover - could ever wish for. I’m glad that the FFs are likeable, but their music bores me. Their friends and peers, Queens of the Stone Age, are an infinitely better band with a fraction of the FF’s following. Many of my friends love the Foos (THEY ROCK!). Good on them. May they have a long career and continue to print money.

The Black Keys - Turn Blue: To be fair, I haven’t listened to this record very much. I’ve liked what I have heard, but it sound too much like what they’ve already done. I’d love to hear another Dan Auerbach solo record produced by someone who won’t obscure his vocals - in other words, not Auerbach or Danger Mouse. The production is just a little too self-consciously retro-hipster to penetrate.

Against Me! - Transgender Dysphoria Blues: I’m happy for Laura Jane Grace’s recent self-actualization, but it still doesn’t change the fact that her band sounds like a second-string, Americanized Manic Street Preachers at best.

Perfume Genius - Too Bright: A not-bad Art Garfunkel solo record.

Run the Jewels - Run the Jewels 2: I’ve never been much of a Killer Mike fan, and I seem to be the only one. I first heard him on the great Outkast track from 2001, “The Whole World,” and I remember thinking he did nothing but dumb the song down. I never cared about El-P either, but again, a lot of other people would disagree with me. Some critics put this record as their number one. Number ones on best-albums-of-the-year lists are always politically safe picks: records that are usually pretty good, or least records that people will have a hard time saying are bad. Everyone knows that the number two spot on a list is usually the writer’s real number one.

(Almost) Anything Nominated for a Grammy: See my previous post. Wow, what a compelling list of reasons to forever ignore music. Some of the aforementioned artists up above would be included in this category as well as Sia, Meghan Trainor, etc.

Ugh... The GRAMMYS

The nominees for The 57th Annual GRAMMYS were announced last Friday. Wow. Now, the GRAMMYS are usually never an indicator of the best music released for a given year, but this year looks particularly devoid of quality. If this was truly the best that the music world had to offer, I wouldn't listen to music.

I won't bore you here with the particulars, but you're interested in being bored, click here.

I mean, there are two entries for the Dio tribute album in the Metal category. Really? Mastodon should win this, but they won't. If there were a creative soul left in NARAS, Mastodon would play a shared twerk-off set with Nicki Minaj. If you don't understand why, just Google the two of them together.

The worst part about it is that I will likely watch the awards show. I can't help it. Hopefully Kendrick Lamar will get to perform. It will help me deal with Deadmau5 inevitably beating Aphex Twin.

In Search of Lost Time: The Mats at Midway

photo by John Christenson

Time has a strange way of expanding the further back in the past you leave it. I moved to Minneapolis in 1999, eight years after the Replacements broke up. It's been 15 years since then, which is longer than the period of time the Replacements were originally together. I've spent longer mythologizing them then they've actually been a band. I'm not alone in this, I'm sure. Last Saturday night I was surrounded by 14,000 other people who are likely in the same boat.

Seeing the Replacements play Midway Stadium in St. Paul the other night was the culmination of a dream come true for a lot of people, myself included. Since moving here I've seen many reunited legendary acts I never dreamed I'd see (Echo and the Bunnymen, Wire, Mission of Burma, Gang of Four, and hey, Big Star). After living here a decade though, I'd given up hope on ever seeing a reunited Replacements.

I spent the first few years here finding traces of the band's presence everywhere: learning my first apartment was across the street from the Twin Tone offices, finding the Let It Be house, working at First Ave., being thrilled that Daniel Corrigan was going to shoot my band for the City Pages. There was plenty of romanticism to feed the mythology I had built up in my head since listening to the Replacements back in college in Iowa City. My outsider status of not being from Minneapolis aligned itself with the feelings of outsider-ness expressed in the Replacements' songs of adolescent confusion and angst. I was in high school when Don't Tell A Soul and All Shook Down came out. A little too young to fully appreciate them, but just young enough to attach a significant weight onto those records.

Gradually, as this city became my home, I built my own experiences that made the legend of the Minneapolis music scene not loom so large. To put it another way, someone like Terry Katzman became a person to me and not just a name I knew from a record sleeve. In all that time, the only Replacement I'd manage to meet was Slim (who couldn't have been nicer - I sold him a Lyle Lovett CD for a song he had to learn for a wedding gig). I got older and wiser and realized that the Replacements were just a band - a great one, sure - but ultimately just a band.

Then slowly, the Replacements started getting back together... kind of. There was the best of collection with the two new songs. Then the tribute/benefit for Slim happened. Then the Riot Fest shows were announced. And then Slicing Up Eyeballs posted that 9-second video of the Replacements rehearsing "Alex Chilton." The video was posted right before I saw it and the thought that somewhere in my city the Replacements could be playing right now made the abstract myth of the Replacements very real and present. The sound was glorious. It was the most exciting 9-seconds of music I had heard in a while.

When my friend bought our tickets to the Midway show I started getting very protective and cautious about my emotions. Working at First Avenue and at record stores for over a decade makes you very jaded as far as rock shows go. I was worried that I'd hype the show up for myself beyond hope of what could be delivered.

In the week leading up to the show I looked at the set lists of the other reunion shows thus far to get an idea of what they'd be playing. I saw a lot from Sorry Ma... which I hadn't listened to in a long time. I went back to it and was surprised how well it held up for me. I started listening to all the records again, making a playlist of my ideal set list, something I hadn't done in preparation for seeing a show in a long time. I let myself get a little more excited.

I'd never been to Midway Stadium. Although the idea of seeing the Replacements in a stadium wouldn't have been my first choice, the fact that it would be the last event held at Midway before it was demolished seemed fitting for a band who spent their career operating under the ironic cliche of snatching defeat out of the jaws of victory. Who else would stage their hometown homecoming at a place not actually in their hometown, at a venue that was doomed to be torn down?

The night was cold and parking was horrible, but there was a giddiness around the stadium from everyone's excitement. That could have been the Grain Belt though. I confess I was dreading that the night would be an endless string of run-ins with everyone I had known in Minneapolis for the past 15 years. Not that I wanted to avoid anyone in particular, I just wanted to concentrate on the show with distraction. I actually only saw a few people I knew. It helped that we sat in the bleachers along left field. The sound was decent and I knew as a short person the sight lines in the crowd wouldn't have been much better. I will say from my vantage point that they probably could have fit another thousand people in there. On the other hand, that would have just made the parking and lines for the porta-potties that much worse.

I'm not a fan of either Lucero or the Hold Steady so I won't judge their performances. They got on stage, did their thing, and got out of the way, which was all that I would have asked of them.

The Replacements took the stage as dusk fell and played a set which closely resembled what they had done at earlier reunion shows. They moved through the songs quickly without too much banter which is exactly what a rock band should do. They were loose too which is important to note. The worst thing you can say about a band is that they sounded tight. That's something you tell your friend's band when you have nothing nice to say. It means that they were predictable and met the most basic functional requirement of playing their instruments in time together. When a band is loose it means they sound spontaneous, like it could come apart at any minute, like the band will never play these songs the exact same way ever again. It means the music sounds raw and alive, which it did.

My cassettes and copy of Boink!!

They played almost every song you might want. The representation by album brokedown thusly: four from Sorry Ma..., three from Hootenanny, five from Let It Be, five from Tim, five from Pleased to Meet Me, three from Don't Tell A Soul, one from All Shook Down, a Westerberg soundtrack cut, and a slew of covers. There was nothing from Stink (boo - I would have killed for "Kids Don't Follow" and "Go") and I would have easily traded "Talent Show" for "I Won't." Still, it's hard to argue with a set that included non-album classics like "If Only You Were Lonely" and "Nowhere Is My Home" (technically both were released on the non-canonical Boink!!). The latter was especially important for me. Originally produced by Alex Chilton, "Nowhere" is in my mind one of their best songs. The fact that's its only release would be on an import-only collection is frustratingly typical. No song better embodies the feeling of growing up lost and alone in the middle of nowhere. Bringing Tony Glover on stage for the Jimmy Reed cover was a nice surprise and a good reminder that the Mats were grounded in blues-based rock more than most of their '80s alt-peers.

By the time of the second encore I just wanted the crowd to shut up. It was obvious the band was freezing. "Unsatisfied" is a great song, but it almost feels perverse to sing along to it en masse. I suppose some people find it comforting, but for me that song is something private. After that last song, the Twin City audience kept clamoring for more, not being able to (or not wanting to) recognize that it was the end. You can read that last sentence metaphorically or not. It would have been really great if they would have gotten a Minneapolis police officer to come on stage and say, "Hello? This is the Minneapolis police. The party is over. If you all just grab your stuff and leave there won't be any hassle."

I'd like to say that the night provided some personal revelation or reconciliation with my past hero worship of the band, but I'm too old to lie to myself like that. They were simply a great rock and roll band, something that is unfortunately rare these days. They're the real thing. They still come off like dorks who practice in a basement - and I mean that in a good way. There's no pose or pretentiousness or anything that smacks of professionalism. And yet, there's a self-awareness and sense of humor about themselves that keeps them from some maudlin display of over-earnestness. Their performance validated my impression of them and of what I always thought rock and roll should be.

People always talk about how the indie rock bands of the '80s would have cashed in and made it big had they peaked in '91 instead of '84 or '85. I don't know if that's true. I think if the Replacements were a new band coming out today they would still struggle commercially. Most of the public doesn't want something real. Reality's not pretty; it makes you think and feel. I still think the Replacements are too good for the masses.

Here's a full set list from the night which differs from Andrea Swensson's list (hey Andrea!) in that I had "I Don't Know" listed last in the regular set, not "Bastards." I remember thinking it was typical Mats to end on such an ode to ambivalence rather than a generation anthem.

Favorite Thing
Takin’ a Ride
I’m in Trouble
Don’t Ask Why
I’ll Be You
Valentine
Waitress in the Sky
Tommy Got His Tonsils Out / Third Stone from the Sun
Take Me Down to the Hospital
I Want You Back
Going to New York w/ Tony Glover
Color Me Impressed
Nowhere Is My Home
If Only You Were Lonely
Achin’ to Be
Kiss Me on the Bus
Androgynous
I Will Dare
Love You Till Friday / Maybelline
Merry Go Round
I Won’t
Borstal Breakout
Swingin’ Party
Love You in the Fall
Can’t Hardly Wait
Bastards of Young
I Don’t Know / Buck Hill (Is that what that was?)

First Encore
Skyway
Left of the Dial
Alex Chilton

Second Encore
Unsatisfied

In honor of those Replacements who weren't at the Midway show, here's a playlist of songs the band didn't play on Saturday. It spans their initial run and is an excellent illustration of just how great this band is/was. These left-behind songs are better than most people's greatest hits.

Steely Dan? Who the Hell Am I?

One constant of my music taste has always been my extreme distaste for Steely Dan. In the past, I have described listening to their music as akin to drinking a tall glass of lukewarm vomit. Their aping of jazz tropes mixed with sleazy subject matter approached with a patronizing pseudo-intellectual tone concocted an overall stew of 70s session man "grooviness" that has always made me gag.

And yet, I've always respected Donald Fagen and Walter Becker from a distance. They are very good at what they do. They made the music they wanted to in an exacting, precise fashion. What I deemed as their awfulness was never a mistake. The fact that they made music that terrible on purpose made dislike them even more.

So it is with great personal confusion that I admit that I have recently reevaluated their music, and discovered with some shock and horror that I like Steely Dan. There have been weeks over the past nine months during which there have been periods where I have listened to little else. I am fine with being proven wrong, but such a dramatic shift in my own opinion has made me question the very fabric of my being. I like Steely Dan? Do I even know who I am anymore?

To be fair, this isn't something that happened overnight. I've grown an appreciation for them slowly over the past few years starting with their debut album. It had always been with some embarrassment that I would admit to myself how much I liked the verses of "Reelin' in the Years." I say the verses because this 70s FM nugget's cheesy guitar lead and chorus always gave me hives. However, the verse's piano riff and Fagen's sardonic (Steely Dan, in a single word) vocals are sublime. Song by song, their first album, Can't Buy A Thrill (1972), revealed itself to me to be distinct from the rest of their catalog. I could admit to liking one of their records. The fact that critics and album guides singled the album out from the rest of their work as being more rock 'n' roll made me more comfortable liking it. Here was a band that began with a promising anomaly, but quickly fell off the deep end of jazz rock pretension and smug hipster intellectualism.

Further investigation was halted by the first track on their second album, "Bodhisattva." This song ranks up there with "Sugar Magnolia" as one of my least favorite songs of all time. Bookending the rest of their career with the later sleazy, predatory "Hey Nineteen" from Gaucho (1982), I was able to dismiss everything else in between.

So what changed? Well, at first, I was exposed to their music little by little through external sources: the Minutemen's cover of "Doctor Wu," the hilarious albeit exaggerated characterization of them in the Yacht Rock series, and the VH1 Classic Albums documentary about Aja (1977). I was even secretly thrilled when Becker and Fagen won the Grammy Album of the Year in 2001 in a startling upset for their comeback, Two Against Nature. All these incidents opened my mind towards them, but it took something more personal to fully bring me around.

I came to embrace Steely Dan through periods of great stress. The first time was while I was editing my first issue of The Chord, the newsletter of the record store where I worked. I was under deadline working in my basement office hours after the store had closed, catching peripheral glimpses of mice scuttle by my door as I struggled to learn InDesign on the job. It was in this environment that the first album truly took hold. Something about the music helped me cope with the crushing fear of failure.

Steely Dan make music about pathetic losers, cowardly cheats, gangsters, perverts, junkies, and reprobates - desperate people who have nothing left to lose. Listening to the stories of the characters in their songs I am reminded by something Leonard Cohen once said about staying in hotels. Cohen said one always has the feeling in a hotel room of being on the lam, a safe moment in the escape, a refuge and sanctuary of a temporary kind, a place in the grass while the hounds pass by. This was the feeling I got listening to Can't Buy A Thrill in the late hours of the night (or early hours of morning) engaged in the exercise of amateur journalism.

This past spring saw me working late nights, taking work home during the week and on weekends. This time I fell in deeper than just the first album. When everything is bearing down on you there's something relaxing about the Dan's epic ambivalence. It's a shrug of the shoulders as your just about to go over the cliff.

Below is a playlist that prunes the catalog for my favorite touchstones. A lot of these are the hits, but you'll note that "Bodhisattva" is still conspicuously absent.